Ranker’s Return

“Amazing! It is really amazing! Crescent Moon has defeated Jeblin, the second raid monster in just 4 minutes and 21 seconds!” Jang Junhyung’s excited voice filled the stadium. He was really surprised. Hyeonu’s performance was above his expectations; it transcended common sense.

‘Killing a humanoid type boss monster alone...’

Everyone who was interested in Arena knew it was several times more difficult to kill the fire demon, Jeblin, than the snow mountain cyclops.

‘The most amazing thing is that it took less than 5 minutes.’

The really surprising thing was the clear time. Hyeonu killed a boss monster alone in just 4 minutes and 21 seconds. The other broadcasters made precisely this point.

“It is really amazing. Gang Hyeonu... 4 minutes and 21 seconds. He killed Jeblin in a ridiculously short amount of time. Jeblin is said to be one of the most demanding bosses ever released.”

“He has to be difficult. Jeblin’s level is higher than any boss monster in the league.”

As Chae Yunho and Lee Wanghoon exchanged words with each other, their voices contained feelings of awe toward Hyeonu. They found his performance really amazing.

“I’m really looking forward to Arena Week this year. I think it is a great opportunity for the winning team to emerge from South Korea.”

“It was once known as the powerhouse of e-sports, but after the era of virtual reality games, it has become like this. It is time to reclaim the glory of the past now that Alley Leader is a professional gamer.”

The two of them went beyond simply praising Hyeonu and thought of the honor that he would bring. Arena Week wasn’t just for the team’s honor but the honor of the country. Which country’s league would the winning team emerge from? It was an immense battle of pride.

“Ah!!! Just now, Emro Sparks made a mistake. Their priest was logged out by Jeblin’s spear.”

Just then, the scene of Emro Sparks’ raid was shown on the screen. The bright red spear of the fire demon pierced the priest in white. Right after being pierced, the priest’s body burned, and he disappeared without leaving even a corpse.

“This is a very big mistake! The lack of a priest means there will be a problem with the team’s survivability. There is a significant difference between having two people using healing magic and just one person using it!” Lee Wanghoon exclaimed in an agitated voice.

Chae Yunho added, “It isn’t just that. Their buff distribution will also have problems. Buffs have a strict cooldown time. The rise in skill proficiency decreases cooldown time, but it doesn’t make it disappear!” 

The huge mistake was enough to cause Emro Sparks’ raid to fail. The screen changed to a scene featuring a different team. This time, it was JT Telecom—the team that ranked second in the first raid time attack and was 1st in the last league’s raid time attack.

“JT Telecom is still stable. However, that is all. They can never get a quick clear time this way!” Lee Wanghoon commented.

JT Telecom was performing stably. Like a machine, they shifted the aggro with great coordination and attacked without any signs of being overwhelmed. It was fantastic gameplay in Arena but not in the competition. Although it was important to kill the boss monster, the time it took to kill was even more important. In that respect, it was difficult for JT Telecom to score highly.

“I think differently. JT Telecom knows that killing Jeblin is a challenge. The clear time is a concern prioritized after killing Jeblin. What is the use of showing all the patterns in 30 minutes if you are wiped out in the 35th minute? It doesn’t make sense,” Chae Yunho said.

He had a different opinion from Lee Wanghoon and believed JT Telecom’s choice was right. Dealing with Jeblin was clearly difficult. The high level of difficulty could be guessed just from looking at Emro Sparks’ performance. Emro Sparks might be a weak team, but they had killed the snow mountain cyclops with ease. Yet they had lost their priest to Jeblin in just five minutes. They couldn’t hold on until the end.

“Of course, I admit it. However, JT Telecom isn’t a team that should be aiming for this level.”

Lee Wanghoon also knew it, but he was talking from JT Telecom’s current position. JT Telecom was battling UK Heights for second place, so they shouldn’t be stopping at simply killing Jeblin.

“We should stop talking about this and focus on the game,” Jang Junhyung said, cutting off the conversation between the two. Talking about it in the review program after the game would be fine. Now was the time to focus on the current situation.

***

The Jeblin raids ended one after another, and the teams that failed the raids appeared. It wasn’t just one or two teams that failed but three.

“I will announce the results of the second raid time attack. Let me start with the teams that succeeded in the raids. There are a total of five teams—JT Telecom, UK Heights, Barrett Fighters, Crescent Moon, and... Ellen Waze!!!”

Once Jang Junhyung finished speaking, sighs flowed from the crowd. They had already seen the raids with their own eyes, but it felt different hearing the results announced like that. There had been an accident. The name of a team that should be mentioned wasn’t called out, and the name of a team that was unlikely to be mentioned was present.

“It is an accident, an accident. The Charlotte Dragons players were all logged out at 1 hour and 10 minutes and the raid failed.”

Charlotte Dragons was one of the main characters of the league. Yet this team, the fourth place team in the last league, had failed the second raid of the current league.

“There is something more amazing than Charlotte Dragons failing in the raid. Ellen Waze, who has the lowest power, defeated Jeblin in 1 hour and 42 minutes.”

The even more remarkable thing was Ellen Waze’s raid success. Charlotte Dragons and Emro Sparks had failed, so everyone thought it was natural that Mino Dyrus and Ellen Waze, the less powerful teams, would fail as well. No one had doubted it. Jeblin was such a difficult boss monster after all. Then Ellen Waze overturned everyone’s expectations and succeeded.

“Let me announce the clearance records of the teams.”

[1st place: Crescent Moon, 4 minutes and 21 seconds.

2nd place: JT Telecom, 1 hour, 29 minutes, and 58 seconds.

3rd place: UK Heights, 1 hour, 31 minutes, and 25 seconds.

4th place: Ellen Waze, 1 hour, 42 minutes, and 00 seconds.

5th place: Barrett Fighters, 1 hour, 47 minutes and 41 seconds.

Charlotte Dragons is disqualified.

Emro Sparks is disqualified.

Mino Dyrus is disqualified.]

The records of the raid time attack appeared on the screen.

“The difference between first and second place is huge. The gap between 2nd and 5th place isn’t that big, so you can see that the 1st ranked Crescent Moon is too overwhelming,” Chae Yunho expressed his admiration while watching the screen.

With Hyeonu, Crescent Moon was overwhelmingly in first place. No, it was more accurate to say that Hyeonu was first place. It was because the other players had done almost nothing in the raid.

Just then, Jang Junhyung picked up the microphone. “Due to the delay in time, we will quickly conduct an interview with Crescent Moon, who is first in the raid time attack. All other teams, please go down from the stage,” Jang Junhyung said, quickly clearing the stage.

The crowd started to clap, and the players waved at them before stepping off the stage.

‘There are around... 20 minutes left?’ Jang Junhyung realized.

Things were delayed slightly due to interviews with the winning team being in the middle, as well as other factors. As a result, the event had taken up more than the allowed time.

‘I have to finish the interview quickly...’

***

The players from Crescent Moon, including Hyeonu, gathered in the parking lot of Arena Stadium, where there were still quite a few cars. It had taken Crescent Moon a long time to get out of the stadium due to the large number of spectators. Now, the players were loading themselves in the vehicle in turn.

The moment Hyeonu sat down next to him, Mason started to urge Hyeonu, “Hyung, turn it on quickly, quickly.”

Sunny frowned and scolded Mason, “Wait, I’m not done with my makeup yet.”

“This is enough. How much more are you going to do? This is more like doing it again from scratch than fixing it,” Mason bickered with Sunny.

Hyeonu stopped these two people: “Wait a minute. I’m turning it on. Just two or three minutes.”

Today, Hyeonu had prepared a surprise event for the viewers. It was so they wouldn’t be disappointed with Crescent Moon’s short period of activity since they could only be seen in the Winter League. Hyeonu took some things out of his bag and started handing one to each of the team members. The item was a white tablet PC with a small button at the top.

“You can look at this while talking. If you want to turn the camera, just press the button,” Hyeonu explained after passing out the tablets. “Now, I’ll turn it on.”

He got up and attached a small object to the ceiling of the bus. It was a camera. The event Hyeonu prepared was to do a stream in reality. It took around 30 minutes to travel from Arena Stadium in Sangam-dong to their accommodations in Gangnam. Of course, it was nighttime presently, so that was the amount of time it would take if there was no traffic jam. Originally during this time, most people were lying down and sleeping or eating something and watching Arena videos.

‘It is time that is used in a meaningless manner...’

So Hyeonu thought that he should use this time to communicate with the people who loved Crescent Moon. At this moment, the viewers were receiving messages that made them doubt their eyes.

[Streamer ‘Alley Leader’ has started streaming.]

[Streaming all the way to Crescent Moon’s dormitory.]

Alley Leader had appeared at an unexpected time. The viewers rubbed their eyes and entered Hyeonu’s streaming page like a tide. It quickly reached over 100,000 people.

“Wow, crazy! Look at the speed at which the number of people is increasing!”

“Does this make sense? Is it like this all the time?”

Two Crescent Moon players looked at Hyeonu with surprise. They had expressions of asking for an answer.

Hyeonu looked at Sunny and Lee Hoon and told them the facts, “Yes, it’s like this all the time. Though it is a bit slow today. Is it because of the time?”

The two people became even more speechless when they heard this.

“Getting 100,000 just by turning it on?”

“This is ridiculous...”

Hyeonu told the two awkward-looking people about reality: “You do know that 100,000 people are watching your expressions right now?”

Then he clapped and caught the attention of his team members. 

“I turned on the streaming mode, so shouldn’t we say hello?”

The viewers agreed with Hyeonu’s words. In the first place, the stream had already begun.

-Right!

-It’s been one minute since the stream was turned on, yet no one is watching the chat window.

-As expected of Alley Leader. He has the most sense.

Hyeonu looked at the camera and waved. “Hello, this is Gang Hyeonu of Crescent Moon.”